Duke had given up 348 yards per game in its first three, but Kansas gashed the Blue Devils for 528 yards in the Jayhawks’ 35-27 win last weekend.
Duke coach Mike Elko said the biggest issue in the loss was “communication.”
“If you and I have to get on the same page, and I just assume we are on the same page and don’t talk to you, then there is a chance we aren’t on the same page. You might think one thing, and I might think another, and we don’t get it right. That was where the defensive breakdowns came from,” Elko told reporters at his weekly presser on Monday.
Kansas QB Jalon Daniels was 19-for-23 passing for 324 yards and four TDs, and had 83 yards and a TD on the ground.
The TD run was a 30-yarder that Elko said his D contributed to.
“We have to understand when it is OK to strip the football and when it’s more important to just tackle. That is something that reared its head on the long touchdown run. We just have to do a better job wrapping and finishing,” said Elko, who was the defensive coordinator at Wake Forest and Texas A&M before taking the job at Duke in December.
“When you play an extremely athletic offensive that goes sideline to sideline, it puts your kids in more stress tackling. We didn’t handle it the way we wanted to, but we will go back to work and be better.”
This week, Duke gets a Virginia team that is still trying to find its way on offense under new coach Tony Elliott, who abandoned former offensive coordinator Robert Anae’s Air Raid scheme in favor of a more balanced pro-style offense.
Through four games, UVA is averaging 18.3 points and 381.8 yards per game, down sharply from the 34.6 points and 515.8 yards per game the offense averaged in 2021.
“From a skill standpoint, it is still the same kids. That group that was terrifying the ACC last year, scoring all those points, is the same group of skill kids. Not many of them have left. We certainly have a lot of respect for what they are capable of being,” Elko said. “They are not off by much, and you still see it on the majority of the plays. I think there has just been a handful of things that has dropped them behind the chains, which is probably why they aren’t scoring to the degree they want to. They are not far off from getting back to where they have been.”
Elko, with his background on the defensive side of the ball, has been impressed with what new Virginia defensive coordinator John Rudzinski has done with the UVA defense, which gave up 31.8 points and 466.0 yards per game last year, and through four games this year is allowing 19.3 points and 350.0 yards per game.
“These guys are physical, but they are really athletic. This is an explosive, twitchy, athletic front. Kansas presented a little bit of that to us, but this is the first time we are going to see that type of front,” Elko said. “While it is a challenge, our offensive line is going to have to step up and protect Riley [Leonard]. They blitz a little bit more, and they are more exotic on third down. That is where some of those stats are coming from. I think this one is unique and certainly protecting our quarterback and running the football will always be essential to us to have success.”
Leonard, a sophomore, has put up nice numbers through the season’s first four games – 1,047 yards, six TDs, two INTs, a 71.3 percent completion rate, a 174.0 passer rating, plus 201 yards and two TDs on the ground.
“He is a great kid and is well-respected in our community. He does great in school, but when he gets on the football field, he is a competitor,” Elko said. “No competitor wants to be told where he stacks up in that level. He has a chip on his shoulder, but we have a ton of confidence in him, and we have since we named him the starter. We are really happy with the way he is playing, and he is doing a good job for us, so I think he is just going to continue to grow and develop.”
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Chris Graham
